Copperas Cove found that to be more than true Wednesday night when it inaugurated its newly opened Bulldawg Gym with an easier-than-expected 70-54 victory over Temple in boys basketball action.
For Cove coach David Farber and his pack of Bulldawgs, it was just what they needed as they only had won one of their previous nine starts.
However, for Temple’s Bruce Etheridge, it was an unwelcome guest - a leftover in Bad Santa’s bag of tricks. In the brutal honesty column, the Wildcats really couldn’t do zilch against a team that was fired up about playing the first boys game in its new kennel.
“A few days can make a big difference,” an obviously disappointed Etheridge said after losing to his former assistant. “Saturday night against Georgetown, we played like the best team in the district and tonight we played like the worst team in the district.
“We didn’t have any energy and really didn’t do anything well.”
Not really a good situation for the Wildcats because they must return to District 13-5A action Friday when they host Killeen Shoemaker at 7:30 p.m. Temple, now 8-12 for the season, is 0-1 in district, while the Grey Wolves are 1-1 in 13-5A and 17-4 for the year.
“If we needed to play this way tonight, so we could get back to a higher level Friday against Shoemaker, that will make it better,” Etheridge said. “It was a poor performance, inside, outside, anywhere.”
Farber pointed to his team’s effort as a major key in its seventh win in 18 games.
“We’re not worrying about the score,” he said. “Right now, we’re just trying to play every play. For us, every possession counts.”
The numbers were an indictment of Temple’s performance in a game that saw the Wildcats fall behind by a 16-4 margin with 2:54 to go in the first quarter as Cove reeled off 12 consecutive points.
In the decisive first half, Temple made just eight of 28 field-goal attempts and was outrebounded 29-19 with Cove owning the offensive glass. Statisticians had to take their shoes off to calculate the turnovers. Cove exited the court after 16 minutes up 36-22.
Despite four 3-pointers by Temple junior guard D.J. Wright, Cove increased the lead to 16 points after three periods as it put down eight of its 12 shots and took a 10-2 edge on the boards.
The two teams played to a 14-14 standoff in the fourth period. In the second half, Temple never got closer than 11 points at 41-30 and fell behind by as many as 23 at 67-44 with 3:24 remaining in the game.
Wright finished with 21 points - all on 3-pointers. The next-highest Temple scorer was sophomore forward Eric Valdez with seven. The Wildcats made 20 of 53 shots and finished with a scant 28 rebounds.
Cove had six players with eight or more points, including 17 by junior Raheem Odoms. The Bulldawgs put down 26 of 56 shots and finished with 49 boards.
Copperas Cove continues non-district action Saturday when it travels to Taylor for a 6 p.m. game.
sports@temple-telegram.com
